


Valor Lies Beneath the Sea

by sneakypeaches



Category: SEAL Team (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt Clay Spenser, Hurt Trent, Hurt/Comfort, Medical Procedures, Medical Trauma, Near Death Experiences, Not a death fic, Team as Family, Whump, hurt jason, near-drowning, pinky swear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-16
Updated: 2019-12-30
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:02:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,648
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21814135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sneakypeaches/pseuds/sneakypeaches
Summary: “He was well and truly trapped and for a horrifying second, Clay understood that there was no way out of this. He was actually drowning. He was going to die.”On what should have been a rudimentary recon mission, Clay learns things are really never that simple.
Comments: 60
Kudos: 193





	1. Under Troubled Water

**Author's Note:**

  * For [islandgirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/islandgirl/gifts).



> Merry (early) Christmas, everyone! This is a gift for islandgirl, as part of our Secret Santa swap over on the SEAL Team Discord. Islandgirl requested a fic that had "anything with Clay whump." Your wish is my command. :)
> 
> Also, the next chapter of The Eleventh Hour will be up soon. So many apologies for the delay. My kiddo has had croup four times since October and then I was tasked a biiiig project at work (the presentation for that is tomorrow... so that is going to free up a lot of my spare time. PHEW.)
> 
> Enjoy the first chapter!

The Gulf of Aden was deceptively beautiful. Warm seawater caught sunlight and glistened, often inviting unsuspecting guests for a calm and casual swim. Yet, little did they know of the trouble lurking above and beneath the surface of the crashing waves, because it _would_ be a beautiful place for that if it the cove wasn’t fraught with piracy.

And targeted ship bombings.

And riptides.

Never mind that as Clay swam 10 meters down to the shallow, rock-strewn sea bottom of the cove, he had to carefully maneuver around dead coral reefs and the remnants of rotting, half-buried shipwrecks, all while pawing away a tangled mess of slimy brown seaweed.

 _Beautiful_ , his ass.

Bravo had been assigned a simple undercover recon mission off the coast of Somalia. Clay hated recons - he was a SEAL for a reason. He thrived on the action and the danger and the adrenaline of schwacking the dirtiest of all dirtbags. But when command called, you went, and long ago he’d resigned himself to the fact that they also had to do the less cool things like escorts and simple surveillance. That even meant if ‘simple surveillance’ involved a mission as routine as planting hidden cameras to gather intelligence on their newest HVT and their affiliates. 

Earlier that morning under the shadow of dawn, Bravo had been ferried in by Full Metal on a rented boat to a small adjacent cove in the Gulf. With their kevlar vests hidden by loose fishing gear, Jason, Ray, Metal, and Brock stayed topside, fishing poles in hand. Down below the churning gray sea, Clay, Trent, and Sonny swam along the rocky shoreline, cut off from the rest of their brothers. 

Just as expected, placing the surveillance cameras went off without a hitch and in less than two minutes, the three SEALs drifted back into the sea like ghosts, with their targets none the wiser that the US government was now gathering intelligence on them. With Trent on point and Sonny close behind him, Clay took the rear while keeping a close eye on his teammates and their surroundings. They swam silently through calm waters towards their fishing vessel, keeping as close to the seabed as possible to avoid detection. 

Easy enough.

Except Clay’s life was never easy these days.

After a strong kick of his fin which slightly shifted his direction to the right, he was swept into a hidden rip. Like the force of a small tsunami, the current tore him in the wrong direction, away from his team. He somersaulted, completely powerless to the ocean surge, dragged against the sandy bottom and hard coral, until -

He was slammed into a wrecked skeleton of a vessel with enough momentum that actually splintered the wood and pushed him deeply into a tangle of broken beams.

He’d had enough experience in the water to know what a riptide felt like, knew their hidden nature and the absolute power they packed. He should’ve given heed to the fact that this particular beach housed a complex, narrow current system of them especially around the collections of broken shipwrecks.

_Should’ve._

Dazed for a second by the painful impact, Clay finally gathered his bearings enough to realize that he couldn’t move, wedged into the mass of planks so tightly that his dive gear was nearly cutting off the circulation in his arms.

His second realization was that he couldn’t breathe.

Fighting a surge of panic, Clay tried to see the problem with his regulator line but couldn’t; whether the splintered wood had entangled, pinched, or torn the line that carried his oxygen, he couldn’t tell.

What he _could_ see, though, was a mess of broken wood, all of which had essentially folded under pressure of his body. Arms pinned and shoulders bent backwards by the lines and straps of his gear - he was trapped at a painful angle and pushed down by the relentless rip.

Shit.

 _Shit_.

This was bad. Really, really bad.

His head snapped up, searching for his brothers. 

Sonny and Trent were there, but they were in the distance to the far left. Their legs propelled them in smooth gliding motions, carrying them further away. They had no idea and he had absolutely no way to signal them.

 _Turn around!_ He willed them in desperation, _God, please, just turn around!_

They didn’t.

Clay bucked and twisted. Got nowhere, pinned down inexplicably hard. He had to find a way. Clay was going to drown here if he didn’t.

He could hold his breath for six minutes, two seconds. It was the longest he’d ever held his breath, but he’d also been in BUD/S at the time and had breached the surface of the pool barely conscious. Even then, pools were contained. Orderly. Warm. Your heart beat was calm, your muscles were relaxed. 

He also knew, in the tiny part of his brain that wasn’t crippled by panic, that holding your breath in a pool was very different from being trapped in the ocean - because Clay was anything but calm. He thrashed, desperate, in a useless effort to fight the skeletal death grip around him but he was failing miserably and had already used up most of his reserves. The more his body bucked, the more his lungs burned like fire. 

And as much as he fought, he didn’t move an inch.

He was well and truly trapped.

For a horrifying second, Clay understood that there was no way out of this. He was actually drowning. He was going to die.

_Please..._

Through water-blurred eyes, desperate to see Trent and Sonny one last time, desperate for a connection, he looked for them.

They were gone.

In their place was the deep gray waters and calmly swaying kelp. The lifeless coral and rotten planks of a drowned boat.

Pain grew and his chest was crushing him. 

Dark spots encroached his vision. 

This couldn’t be it. 

_This couldn’t be it_ _this couldn’t be it this couldn’t be it!_

Despite his slipping consciousness, Clay could feel it all: the bursting, unbearable pressure in his chest. His lungs: a spasming, agonizing mass of fire. Muscles and limbs that pulled and bent and fought and twisted with every bit of strength he possessed because _he had no air, God he needed to breathe!_ A frantic heartbeat that pounded like thunderclaps, inescapably in his head. Then, the very, very real and horrifying fact that this was it.

The bottom line.

He couldn’t take the crushing pain… his body gave up the fight. Clay’s mouth opened and the regulator mouthpiece slipped out from between his lips. He saw an explosion of silvery bubbles that erupted from his mouth, the last breath he had taken, just as he sucked in a flood of water.

Eyes rolled and blown wide, he coughed. Reflexively sucked in more water. Floundered weakly. Got nowhere.

And all sounds were swallowed by the silent, calm sea.

Everything slowed down.

Awareness deadened.

He went still.

Floated.

Gone.

###

“Get in the boat, get in the boat!” Jason cried. The moment Trent and Sonny breached the surface, enemy fire cracked from a vessel a hundred yards to their left. Brock dove for his HK, knelt and returned fire in long bursts, giving Jason just enough cover to lean over the hull and grab Three and Four by the backs of their dive gear, dragging them into the boat. “Havoc, troops in contact! I say again, troops in contact! Everyone stay down! Where’s Clay?”

Bullets rained around them. Trent, barely able to catch his breath, crawled on his belly to the bow where they’d stowed their rifles, managing to tear off his cumbersome dive gear at the same time.

“He’ll be up in a minute, he was a little ways behind us. Sonny!” He called and tossed him his rifle. He ducked as another round of bullets pinged off the hull, just barely missing them.

“Where in the holy hell did these fuckers come from?”

Jason leaned over the edge of the boat, just long enough to get off a rapid series of shots before ducking for cover once more. Sonny was up and firing seconds behind him, but the swaying of both boats from the waves made it hard to hit anything.

Brock shoved a fresh mag into his rifle. “You see how many there are?”

“I got eyes on three,” Ray said as he came up firing, and somehow, even with the pitching of their boats, his shots found center mass. “One down.”

“ _Trent_?” 

And something in Sonny’s voice hit Jason hard in the gut, because Sonny was an absolute force and unwavering and hard-as-nails, and only sounded like that when…

When a brother was down.

Jason’s eyes snapped over and only then realized Four was no longer beside him. A second later and he saw his medic on the deck, a pool of blood forming under his right leg. “Trent!” 

“Jesus! Trent! Where you hit!”

“Let me see, let me see. Move your hands,” Ray had shoved Trent flat on his back, saw the blossom of red near his knee. Shaking hands used the existing rip in his jeans to open it wider… “ _Damn_ , Sawyer,” he puffed out a harsh exhale. “You had to give me a heart attack over a damn scratch?” Panic dimmed and it was wholly replaced by a gratitude that the gash, a neat slice that had barely cut through muscle, wasn’t much, much worse.

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Trent panted through a wince and batted Ray’s hands off of him. He got his elbow under him and reached for his rifle, though noticed that enemy fire had ceased. “Woulda given me a second, I’d’a told you it was a flesh wound.”

“We got all three,” Brock announced. He held a pair of binoculars up and studied the boat, which now bobbed aimlessly and gushed black smoke into wind. “Two have headshots. One’s hit center mass... Twice. I don’t see any other boats but that smoke is gonna turn some heads.”

“Anybody else hit?”

“We’re good.”

“Nice work, boys. Let’s pack up and get outta here.”

“Sonny, hand me that med bag. We’ll need to pack his wound.”

“Guys…” Brock’s brow was pinched and his eyes were wide from adrenaline and… something more? Breathless, he asked, “Where’s Clay?”


	2. Lost and Found

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay I lied. One more chapter. Enjoy :)

“Guys…” Brock’s brow was pinched and his eyes were wide from adrenaline and… something more? Breathless, he asked, “Where’s Clay?”

They froze.

Chatter ceased. 

For a second, there was a strange, surreal disconnection where nothing seemed to compute... and the implications of what that meant were body-numbing.

How was it that _only now was Clay’s absence noticed?_

How much time had passed since Trent and Sonny had surfaced? Five minutes? Ten?

Emotion washed over Jason - hot and cold and stinging. His eyes met Ray’s for a second and then darted to the clear, still water around them. 

Channeling his mounting panic, Jason ordered, “Trent, Metal, stay here!” and then a moment later, four bodies plunged down into the sea, forgoing dive gear that would take precious minutes to don.

There was a small part of him that expected Clay to be right there below the surface, waiting. That perhaps he’d heard the assault and decided to stay clear of the wild bullets that torpedoed into the water around the hull.

But Jason knew Clay better. Knew the kid would never choose safety over his brothers.

As if to prove him right, Clay was nowhere. 

Jason gritted his teeth and continued determinedly forward. They scissor kicked their feet and pumped their arms every ounce of strength they could muster in the direction they were sure their kid would be in. Being on the coastline, the seabed wasn’t far from the surface and they could see what they needed without diving deep. 

Two minutes in with nothing but the shimmering blue green of the open water, they all had to resurface for a breath of air, but only for a second. Diving back down, they pushed on, spread out to increase their chances of seeing their missing brother or even a clue as to what had happened.

Beneath the ocean surface was complete silence. That very silence and his thoughts consumed him. 

The thought that he was searching the vast fucking ocean for his kid… 

The thought that he couldn’t lose another brother to the sea… 

The thought that Clay may be dead or captured or stuck or drowning…

The thought of any of those outcomes was simply not acceptable. 

With a discipline he’d perfected many years ago, Jason stowed all of those thoughts; he boxed up the mounting dread, calmed his racing heart, and swam.

He took in the trajectory of their path and the location of the surveillance gear a few hundred feet ahead. Knowing Clay had been on this very path when something had happened, even considering a margin of error, they had to be close. 

In the eerie gloom, Jason’s eyes followed a path of vegetation. Further and just to the right, more thick clumps of seaweed were rooted, but the long tendrils were flattened and billowing wildly at the sandy bottom by a strong, invisible current. He followed the movement of the kelp further along the seafloor, took in the empty reef and remnants of fishing vessels and… 

Jason’s heart nearly stopped.

The shifting beams of morning sunlight caught on something wafting and unmistakably gold in the current.

Clay’s hair.

_Clay_. 

Floating. Lifeless.

With panicked, chopping strokes forward, Jason made it to him within seconds. Six was entirely swallowed and tangled within a mass of broken planks.

His goggles had been knocked off and his eyes were open, staring. 

_No, no, no!_ Jason desperately grabbed at him, yanked him up as his lungs began to burn for air. A second later, three other sets of hands joined his but Clay didn’t move an inch, was inexplicably trapped. 

In his periphery, he saw Brock swim to the surface for air, just as Ray abandoned his attempt at pulling their youngest’s arms. Instead, he yanked out a switchblade and began cutting at Clay’s dive gear. Sonny was tugging at the boards of the half-sunken ship and had even started to make progress when suddenly Brock was there again, pinching Clay’s nose, pressing his lips to his. Breathing for him.

Time was running out fast. 

Resolve steeled him. They’d come this far and they’d found their brother; Jason wasn’t going to allow a tangled mess of planks to keep Clay from reaching the surface. He was at the end of the line and his lungs absolutely burned for air, tiny bubbles leaking from his nose, but he refused to let go now. Fueled by veritable determination, he furiously tugged and then -

Clay was free.

Four sets of hands grabbed him by his wetsuit and heaved, pulling him up. 

The surface of the water shattered. 

“Over here! Over here!” Ray screamed for Metal in between gulping, noisy pants.

Clay’s head lolled lifelessly in the space against Jason’s neck, blond curls tangled and plastered to his face. Water ran down his cheeks like actual tears, except Clay’s eyes were sightless and Jason was far too aware that...

He looked dead.

He wasn’t breathing. 

Brock took another gasping breath and breathed into Clay’s mouth and though the air went in, it sounded wrong. When he pulled back, water dribbled out of the corner of Clay’s lips, and he otherwise remained slack and unresisting. 

A second later, the fishing vessel was there and his kid was grabbed under his armpits by Trent and Metal; they grunted with effort as they heaved the waterlogged kid into the boat and then he was gone.

“He’s not breathing!” Jason cried to them, dissolving into a coughing fit that left him gasping for breath. Something smarted at his side but he pushed the feeling away and swam towards the ladder hanging from the hull, determined to get the kid back in his line of sight.

Last one in, Ray breathlessly said to him, “I got you,” and helped to hoist him up by the back of his vest. Both weary from the lack of oxygen and intense swim, they fell unceremoniously on their asses, but Ray still managed to yell over his shoulder to Metal, “Go, go, go!” and then the engine roared to life and they were off.

“Is he breathing?” Jason demanded, craning his head to try to get a good look at the far end of the boat. “ _Clay!_ ”

“Man, you’re bleeding,” Ray said and was suddenly almost on top of him. “You hit? Let me see.”

“I’m fine,” he growled, pushing away Ray’s hands.

“They’ve got him,” his 2IC said calmly and firmly pushed him back down. But there was something in his tone - _was that resignation?_

Jason saw it in the younger man’s eyes, knew what he was thinking, and it made him furious. He said low and deadly, “Ray, don’t you dare. _He’s not dead_.”

Ray ignored him. “Let me see your wound, Jason.” He shoved up the saturated shirt, which only now did Jason realize was stained dark red from waist to hem. There was a gaping crevice in his side; he could see where the fat layer separated but certainly hadn’t gone deep enough to cause internal damage. “Alright, it’s a flesh wound. Must’ve been from the shootout earlier. You’re gonna be okay once we get it stitched.”

“God, Ray, I don’t give shit. You need to move,” Jason clenched his teeth until they nearly cracked, still trying to get a better view of the mass of bodies and flurry of activity at the stern. 

Clay’s complexion was waxy and gray in the Somali sun. He was flat on his back, arms sprawled, palms up… fingertips purple… looking like they’d been frozen in a state of reaching for someone. His dive suit and shirt were ripped open. 

Sonny leaned over his head; he was inches from his face and he was begging, “Don’t do this, Clay. C’mon, brother, don’t do this. Breathe!” 

At his side, Trent was performing compressions, hard and fast, arms out straight - one saturated in blood. Their medic was nearly as white as Clay.

“Let me take over, Trent,” Brock said. He’d seen the blood, knew Trent was injured, but Trent just shook his head firmly and continued. 

“Sonny, _go_ ,” he commanded. 

And Sonny leaned down - tilted Clay’s chin up, thumbed open his lips, pinched his nose shut and pressed warm lips to cold ones. 

Breathed.

Still no pulse. No gasp of air.

With a growl of frustration, Trent interlaced his hands and continued the forceful pushes again Clay’s still chest. Water bubbled up from his mouth, trickling down his cheeks with every furious thrust. 

“They’ve got him,” Ray repeated to Jason as he dug out Trent’s med bag. He fished for a wad of gauze and ripped open the package, but Jason just shoved him aside and crawled unsteadily over to his unresponsive teammate. The closer he got, the worse Clay looked, and when he reached out and took Clay’s hand within his own - the feeling of it, cold and flaccid, was visceral. Like a suckerpunch, it stole his breath.

Then Ray was there, took the place directly beside him. Steadied him. A silent wall of unwavering strength.

“C’mon, Clay,” Trent ground out. He was red and dripping with sweat and past a place of exhaustion. No amount of willpower or adrenaline could help him keep up an effective pace after a physical mission and four minutes of hard compressions with a wounded arm. As his endurance waned and muscles quivered and as Clay laid unresponsive and quite literally _dead_ underneath him, fear and anger fused together deep in his gut.

“Brock,” there was a thin layer of acceptance when he spoke; it went against the core of who he was, but if Trent couldn’t physically continue, Five would need to, “I need you to take over compressions on the next round… Sonny, go.”

Sonny leaned down, breathed desperately needed air into Clay’s mouth.

There was another flash of desperation in his wild, brimming eyes as Trent checked and waited for a heartbeat.

Nothing.

Brock pushed himself into the fray and started CPR, and Trent watched hyperfocused to make sure he’d found the right place at Clay’s sternum, poised to take over should his compressions not be absolutely perfect. But each of Reynolds’s thrusts were even and hard and fast and there wasn’t even hesitation when Clay’s ribs bowed and cracked under his hands. 

Thirty compressions, two breaths.

“Sonuvabitch! Don’t you do this Clay! Don’t do this to me!”

Thirty compressions, two breaths.

“Spenser, you are _not_ doing this, do you hear me? You are _not_ dying today!”

_SEALs don’t drown._

“Brock, switch.” 

Trent pushed out thirty compressions, his arm saturated with blood. It ran onto Clay’s chest, made the skin pink and slippery.

“Breathe, damn you! _Breathe!_ ”

Thirty compressions, two breaths.

Water had stopped trickling out of Clay’s mouth.

Thirty compressions, two breaths.

“Brock, switch.”

“Jesus, Clay. You are _not_ dead,” Sonny’s face was wet. He rested the palm of his hand on Clay’s brow, eyes beseeching into Clay’s sightless ones. His voice was ragged. “Fight for me. Fight, dammit! Come on!”

Brock let out a tiny, strangled noise between his rhythmic pushes. His head snapped up and he looked sick, “His ribs just broke.”

“Keep going,” Trent said tersely.

_Too much time. It’d been too long._

From the side, Jason sat, ass on his heels, mute.

He’d seen dead bodies before.

He’d heard the same cries from his same brothers before. 

A vivid and unwanted image of Nate flashed through his mind, cradled in his arms; bloody and silent and _gone._

This was a horrible nightmare and he couldn’t fucking do this again. Clay wasn’t just a sailor, he wasn’t just _Six_. He was Jason’s friend. 

His little brother.

A hot tear spilled out. He squeezed his icy hand and leaned close. “Come on, Clay! Don’t do this!” he practically screamed. “BREATHE!”


	3. Enough

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A few notes... This was supposed to be posted on Christmas Eve, so I'm sorry for the delay! If you celebrate, I hope you had a wonderful holiday.
> 
> I've had a handful of questions about Eleventh Hour. It's not abandoned - in fact, the next chapter is nearly finished and should be up within a few days!
> 
> Thank you very much to Lauren for the beta, and also to those who continually take the time to comment. Your words, good or bad, are more encouraging than you know.

Jason squeezed Clay’s icy hand and leaned close. “Come on, Clay! Don’t do this!” he practically screamed. “BREATHE!”

And for once in his life, Clay did as he was told. 

He spasmed a little; a gurgling cough bringing up a fountain of water.

“Roll him!”

They grabbed Clay together, rolling him onto his side as water gushed from his mouth and nose. He seemed to be choking on the air itself - desperate to both suck air in and expel water out at the same time. The violence of his coughs and heaves and gags was grating and painful.

But it was the sweetest sound they’d heard in a long, long time.

“That’s it. That’s it, little buddy.”

“There you go, Clay.”

“Breathe, brother! Easy now.”

“Get it out, Spenser,” Trent coached him; fingers poised on Clay’s carotid. The _thumpthumpthump_ was wild and pounding but finally _there_. He let out a shaking exhale, watching as the dribbles of frothy sea water lessened and saw Clay’s knees twitch and try to curl upward. Trent finished the movement for him, bringing his knees all the way to a right angle to his belly, the position helping him expel the remaining water from his lungs. “Don’t fight it Clay, keeping coughing and bring that water up.”

After a minute, color had finally come back to his cheeks and the deep, gulping breaths transitioned into even, less desperate pants. 

“Okay, let’s get him flat. Brock, there’s emergency blankets in my pack, grab them all. Clay, you with us? Talk to me.”

Glassy blue eyes blinked. They haltingly found each face above his, not quite aware enough to know what was going on beyond the pain in his chest and his own breathlessness.

Sonny had started to tense back up when Clay remained silent and dazed. “What’s wrong with him? Why ain’t he talking?”

Jason felt sick. _Brain damage_ , a small voice hissed from the back of his mind, because how could Clay possibly be fine, considering how long he’d been left in the sea?

“Give him a minute, he should come around,” Trent said determinedly, as though he wouldn’t accept any other outcome. He wasn’t sure he’d ever get over the flood of emotion that’d hit him after Clay’s gasp of air. “We still got another 20 mikes before we get to the LZ, help me get him out of these wet clothes. Last thing he needs is hypothermia and I want to check him over for injuries, too.”

###

Clay’s awareness broke through in flickers of disjointed images and sounds.

Nothing felt right. Certainly not the strange alternating sensation pins and needles and numbness in his limbs… the heaviness in his chest… the dull touches over his ribs, his pelvis, his arms and legs… prodding and searching... and then pausing to inspect any tender spots… the pressure stroking his hair, exuding tenderness, imperceptibly reminded him of a childhood comfort from his gram.

For the longest time, all he could do was try to make sense of the faces and movements and try to breathe through a pain that grew more fiery by the second. 

Was he… 

Was he wet and cold and… _naked?_

Large, confident hands slid under his shoulder and lifted him into a sitting position. 

_That_ triggered something awful in his chest. Quickly, he was wrapped in something that crinkled and shined, and then someone was apologizing in response to pitiful, distressed whimpers.

… that, he realized, were coming from him.

Clay swallowed down a cough and struggled for a long time to focus on the shifting surroundings, trying hard to see past his own blurry and tear-filled eyes.

He caught sight of the rusty hull of their fishing vessel. A fishing pole. Rifles and dive gear strewn in tangled piles. Trent’s med supplies, everywhere. A worried face drawing close…

Sonny.

He was grinning stupidly and Clay wasn’t sure how his friend could be smiling when he felt this much pain. “Well, there he is. Trent! Trent! I swear he looked right at me, he’s back with us. Hold still, I’m gonna get you comfy buddy. Don’t you worry ‘bout a thing.”

Clay frowned but did as he was told. Sonny disappeared and he was left staring up at a mass of white, puffy clouds… except they seemed to be hurtling quickly by overhead. He stared hard at them, trying to make sense of things, lost in the how or why or when…

Everything was just out of reach.

He was pulled back to rest against something firm and warm. Looking up, he slowly raised his eyes to lock onto a wet, scraggly beard… undoubtedly Sonny, again. 

“Wha,” he rasped, but lost the rest of his question to a grating round of coughs. _God, he was on fire_. The pain was overpowering: each beat of his heart hurt his head so badly that he thought he could feel his veins popping in his temples… his ribs felt like they were sawing his lungs in half…

_What the hell had happened?_

_Was this even real?_

_Why did he feel like death warmed over?_ Except, not quite warmed over, because he was absolutely _freezing_ , shivering, and those shivers only made it all worse.

“Whoa, hold your horses, there, Flicka. Don’t try to talk yet. You just listen to me and you follow my lead and we’re going to do that sniper breathing you’re always going on about, alright? Breathe in...”

Trent appeared in his line of vision. He looked pale and pinched and something black snaked from his ears… Clay squinted… a stethoscope… and realized the cold bell was pressing against his bare chest.

“That’s it,” Trent encouraged the steady breathing, as he auscultated each lobe. Low pitched, rattling rhonchi were clear during each gasp, which was mostly to be expected from his near-drowning. Still, he found relief knowing Clay was able to get in some air. “Follow Sonny’s lead, Clay. I know you don’t feel that great right now, but we’ll get you some oxygen soon, as soon as we get to the bird. Actually, Ray, can you hand me that tank and mask? We can use our dive gear for now.”

“Wh… hpn’,” he tried again, barely able to push out the words past his uncooperative tongue. Clay grimaced at the pain just those few words caused, rolled his head side to side against Sonny’s shoulder. He could barely breathe. Fearfully, he locked eyes with Trent.

There was a warm scoff of air by his ear. “You went for a swim, there, blonde Buchannon. If ya wanted to look for sea glass that bad, all ya had to do was ask.”

“I,” he wheezed, “I… don’... know.. I cn’t, brea…”

“Yes, you can, and you’re doing really good, bud,” Trent assured him soothingly. “I know it doesn’t feel like you can, but you’re getting good air flow. This is gonna help, too, okay? Open your mouth…”

The familiar, rubbery bite-mouth piece of someone’s dive gear slipped between his lips. Pure oxygen filled his mouth and lungs and he sucked in mouthful after mouthful of it, pushing past the squeezing, throbbing pain to _just breathe_.

And as he did, everything became less muted and blurry. He let his eyes wander over the anxious faces of team. 

Frowned at all the red he saw.

He made a garbled sound in the back of his throat and shifted like he was going to move.

“Hey, easy, easy!” Sonny chastised and his arms encircled Clay tighter, restraining. That just made him frown deeper, though, and he made another noise of protest. “What’s going on? You’ve got some busted ribs, kiddo, it ain’t smart to move around like that.”

“I think he’s got his eyes on all the blood,” Ray said perceptively, raising a brow pointedly at One and Four. “Now that Clay’s settled, why don’t we take care of your _bullet wounds_ before you bleed out.” 

_Bullet wounds?_

_Oh, hell no._

He didn’t think his heart could possibly pound any harder and faster than it already was, but it did. Clay spit out the mouthpiece and spluttered, “Sh.. shot?”

Heels dragged against the deck. Clay paled and his eyes shot back and forth between Sawyer and Hayes like they were both dying in front of him and yet _no one was doing a damn thing about it except hovering over his own soggy ass_.

“Jesus, Perry, look what you did,” Sonny exclaimed. “Hey, Spenser, they’re fine. Stop it, _stop_. They’re grazes, that’s all. I swear to you, I saw them myself - only need stitches.”

Trent actually growled. He snatched the hanging mouthpiece, pushed open Clay’s lips, and slipped it back inside. When his hand fell away, it was shaking. “ _Breathe_. Christ, Spenser, take a damn breath. Last thing I need is for you to go into respiratory distress on me, _I just got you back_.”

And so he breathed. Heart beat slowed, just enough to feel like it wasn’t going to pound right out of his chest. He stared at Trent, desperate for more answers.

“We’re fine,” Trent continued. “Yeah, we got tagged, but they’re grazes. Neither of us is going to bleed out. Perry’s going to stitch up my arm and I’ll stitch up Jason’s side, and all the while, you are going to sit there _and not move and just breathe_. That’s it. We clear?”

To that, Clay nodded. After years of practice, he knew when to shut up and listen to his medic.

Trent backed away with a sigh, scrubbing his face with his good arm. Ray dug out the suture kit and snapped on a pair of purple gloves. 

Knowing things were handled, Clay’s eyes drifted closed.

“Hey, what’s this? No sleeping on the job…” Sonny murmured, although Clay felt his head being eased back and his body shifted into a more comfortable position. And then just before he drifted off, he heard the Texan promise, “You’re gonna be just fine.”

###

There was no sound except for the machines; the rhythmic beeps from the cardiac monitor, the whirring of the myriad of IV pumps that pushed in medications and fluids, and an occasional hiss as the blood pressure cuff inflated every 15 minutes. 

There was no movement either. There was just Clay, resting in a semi-reclined position, and _alive._

Brock wasn’t a stranger to ICU’s - in fact, he’d spent a good few months in one himself recovering from a snowboarding accident his freshman year of high school, so he was used to the sights and smells and the lack of privacy. It was different being on the other side of the bedrail, though. Where before he’d spent most of his time drifting in a drug-induced stupor, now there was too much time to overanalyze doctor’s updates, too much time to worry over each short tachycardic burst or hypoxic event, and too much time to study each wince or the way Clay curled his toes when his pain medications began to wear off.

Too much time reliving the sudden feeling of Clay’s ribcage fracturing and crunching, cartilage popping, under the pressure of CPR. Seeing purple lips and wet eyelashes that clumped to hide sightless sea-blue eyes. His muscular belly see-sawing in opposition to each rhythmic compression _._

Brock swallowed hard as those images ripped through him. And each time his thoughts came back to them, he had to close his eyes, take a breath. Push back the nausea. He wasn’t a stranger to pain, but he was a stranger to _this_ : being directly responsible for a brother’s pain. 

They had made it to the LZ and were flown to the nearest Naval Hospital. It’d taken two hours to get an update on their brother from the Intensive Care Unit, but when they did, the list was impressive: several fractured ribs, a fractured clavicle, and a mild concussion combined with waterlogged lungs wasn't the best situation, but their kid was alive. Clay was hooked up to oxygen via nasal cannula and would be monitored over the next 48 hours for Adult Respiratory Distress Syndrome, yet another syndrome from this miserable op that could’ve killed him. The abrasions from being dragged across coral and rocks and thrown into a sunken ship were already beginning to scab over, but his med team was still concerned about bacteremia and septicemia - even more complications that could take their brother away.

 _No big deal_ , Brock mused humorlessly, as they were shown up the elevator to the ICU. Except it totally was. 

Twelve hours later, after Clay had woken a handful of times but only briefly, Trent had abandoned the chair opposite of Brock’s to go find Clay’s day shift doctor - something about requesting a change in meds because he’d noticed that, despite Clay being semi-sedated, he still managed to lift an arm and itch any piece of bare skin he could reach. Leave it to Clay to be allergic to the most common antibiotics. Jason and Sonny had left for the cafeteria to grab some coffee, while Ray left to shower in the staff bathroom.

That left Brock, standing watch.

Something he was good at, especially with the kid sleeping. A sleeping Clay couldn’t cause problems, so he could handle it. 

But then, Clay opened his eyes and met his gaze.

The kid opened his mouth and his automated attempt to speak immediately set off a coughing fit. Within seconds, the monitor above Clay’s head began a series of warning chimes, alerting of a steadily decline in oxygen levels and an increase in heart rate.

“Jesus, Clay,” he managed, shooting out of his chair. He thumbed the call button, alerting the nurses station that they needed assistance. “Take a deep breath, alright? The nurse will be here in just a second.”

Feeling more lost by the second, Brock could only stand there, frozen, as Clay wheezed and tried to suck in as much air as he could in between grating coughs. His face was grey and pinched and tears leaked out of his eyes; still as weak as a kitten, he dragged one arm up to clutch at painfully spasming ribs - the other, with the broken clavicle, laid limp and useless on a c-pillow at his side.

“Hey! What’s going on?” Trent and two trauma-physicians hurried into the room, darting straight for Clay’s bedside. “Clay?”

“He can’t breathe,” Brock barely made out through a cloying sense of deja vu. He broke out in a sweat. “Trent, he can’t breathe.”

“Okay, no problem,” Trent said calmly, and Brock could only stare at him like he had three heads, because how _the fuck could he be calm right now?_ “I’m gonna sit you up, Clay, and that’s going to help your breathing.”

“No-” Clay rasped out. Panicking, terrified as nameless faces diverged above him.

“Petty Officer Spenser, please don’t fight us-”

“He needs morphine,” Trent demanded. 

One of the physicians nodded in agreement. “I’ll grab it from the med cart. The coughing fit probably triggered this, and the pain is just making the spasms worse.”

As dark spots encroached on his vision and he felt faint, Clay was forced to acquiesce. 

Trent inclined the bed until Clay was sitting up straight in a high Fowler’s position while the doctor switched out the nasal cannula for a bulky non-rebreather mask. Trent also took a spare pillow from the foot of his bed and pressed it to his chest with just enough pressure to brace him. “There we go, I bet that feels better, huh Spenser?” He shushed Clay when the kid let out a moan that sounded panicked. “Easy. Don’t panic, kid, I need you to calm down. I know that’s hard and I know you hurt, but the harder you fight this, the harder it’s going to be to breathe… that’s it, deeper breaths… slower. _Slower…_ that’s it, brother. Good.”

A few minutes later, Clay was slumped against the pillows, glassy eyed and drenched in sweat. Once the morphine was in, the doctor carefully held the bell of his stethoscope to Clay’s chest for a long while, while the other trauma surgeon studied Clay’s chart, tucking an errant grey curl behind his ear. He glanced back up at the telemetry monitors and made a happy noise at the steadying numbers he saw there. Petty Officer Sawyer knew his men well, and the opiate had seemed to do the trick. Now they just had to make sure that it didn’t work _too_ well. They left quickly after that, one going to order a nerve block to further ease Clay’s pain levels, and the other promising that he’d send in the nurse’s assistant for a bedbath.

Trent sighed. He knew how busy the ICU was today and with a floor filled with critical patients, a bed bath would be last on the staff’s mind. “Keep an eye on him. I’m gonna get some supplies so we can wipe him down and in a new gown,” he said, and promptly left for the adjacent private bathroom.

Which left Brock alone with the kid. _Again_.

He nervously glanced between Clay’s face and the bedside monitor, just waiting for things to go to shit. _Again_. 

Clay must’ve caught the deer-in-headlights look, because after studying him for a minute, he cleared his throat… waited to make sure it wouldn’t set off another coughing fit… and then bravely whispered, “You good?” 

The words were nearly lost inside the rubbery plastic of the mask, but Brock caught them. And blanched. Swallowing, he fell back tiredly into his chair and felt a muzzle nudge his knee. Cerb. Brock’s hand found its way to his back, kneading the fur there, and almost instantly, he felt a degree more grounded. “ _Me_?” He shakily blew out a laugh. “I’m fine, man. Are _you_ good?”

Clay nodded. “ ‘m good.” and then said again more firmly, “I _am_. Worry too much.”

Clay felt anything _but_ good; the coughing fit had wiped him out and, despite having been sleeping on and off for the day, he was already wishing for another nap. But something was off with Five; he tried to scrutinize the typically quiet and nonchalant man but he felt too fuzzy and spacey to deduce anything other than _something was not right_. He was holding something back, and Clay couldn’t sleep until he figured it out. He tried a different approach after Brock stayed stubbornly silent for another minute. “Where’s’guys?”

“Trent’s getting you a change of clothes. Jase and Sonny went down to the cafe for some coffee, they should be back any minute. Ray hit the showers.” Brock glanced back up at the monitors. Pulse: 78, Respirations: 28, O2: 96, Blood Pressure: 139/85. He didn’t know what any of that meant, but figured he’d be hearing the alarms if anything was seriously out of whack. He flicked his gaze back to Clay, who was still studying him with hooded but curious eyes.

Something seemed to click and Clay once again broke the silence. “Trent told me what you did.” Sleep pulled him, but he knew the importance of getting these words out. He blinked heavily: once, twice… three times. He slurred, “You saved my life. I owe you, man.”

Brock shook his head. “You don’t owe me anything, and… I think I should actually be apologizing. I broke your ribs, kid.” He ran a hand through the back of his curls, his hair was even wilder than normal because of the ocean salt. “This,” He guiltily gestured to Clay- his weak form, the hospital bed, the wires and tubes and monitors. “I don’t think you’d be this bad if I hadn’t broken all your ribs.”

“I don’t think I’d be here if you hadn’t,” Clay fixed him with a hard stare. “Don’t put that on yourself, Reynolds. Seriously, thank you. Owe you a case. Maybe even some tequila.”

“Did I hear someone say tequila? Better make that a round for everyone, Sparky. I swam through shark-infested waters to find your lost ass,” and then Sonny was there, carrying a tray of coffees, making his presence known as loudly as possible. He’d pushed open the glass door with his hip, hooked a chair with his ankle, which he dragged to Clay’s side and slumped into it. He’d brought his coffee halfway to his lips when he stopped, did a double-take at Clay’s face. “What in the… what’s with the mask, you didn’t have that on when we left. Brock? And where’s Trent? What the hell’s happening?”

Jason was against the foot of his bed, double fisting two styrofoam cups. Ignoring Sonny, Clay squinted his eyes to inspect the label between his fingers. In Sonny-squiggled penmanship was: DECAF/BLONDIE. Despite his pain, an impromptu smile found its way to the surface. “For me?” He asked, muffled beneath the oxygen mask. Clay licked his dry lips with unabashed eagerness and reached out.

But Jason was eyeing the mask. “Nuh uh. Not unless Trent says so. Brock, sitrep, what the hell happened? He was fine thirty minutes ago.”

Clay slouched back and frowned petulantly.

While Brock gave his brothers a play-by-play, Trent came back into the room; he carried a pink tub full of soapy water, washcloths, a bath towel, and what looked to be a paisley-patterned hospital gown. 

Clay frowned deeper at the sight of the gown, wished it to be his street clothes. He was becoming more groggy by the minute, but his respirations were easing; the chuffs of air were now soft and regular and spoke only of _exhaustion_ , not abnormality like before. Even his pain was muted by it. As far as he was concerned, he was feeling fine enough get the hell out of there. 

“We goin’ home?” he dared to whisper, his throat starting to tickle again like he needed to cough. He knew he’d done a lot to his system, but the idea of a nap in the safety of his hammock and the comfortable rocking of the C-17 was all he wanted. “Feel better.”

“Not on your life,” Trent groused, as he placed the pink tub on Clay’s nightstand. “Your oxygen is low eighties without oxygen and you’re on IV antibiotics to prevent infection. You feel better because we’ve got you on fluids, antiemetics, and pain meds.”

Clay rolled his head miserably on the pillow. 

Jason went to sit on the edge of Clay’s bed, hip tucked against the bed rail. He gently smacked his toes, but then left his hand there. “Christ, kid, you look like shit. You wanna stick around here and play nurse a little longer, or do you wanna be back stateside in time for Christmas?” With Clay’s big doe-eyed nod at the latter, he continued. “Well, then as soon as Trent gets you changed, you’re getting some sleep so you can start to feel better. That’s an order.”

 _That_ sounded like a compromise he could make, and so he chuffed out, “Okay.”

Clay closed his eyes; though his breath slowed even further, pulled by a heavy dose of medications, it hadn’t yet evened out into sleep. Soon it would. 

But first… His eyes opened just enough that a thin sliver of blue peaked out. “Thanks guys… for not giving up.. on me.”

Jason leaned forward a little from where he sat, and made damn well sure that the kid’s gaze came back to his. He vowed to himself that moving forward, he’d always keep Six safe, always - just as Clay did the same for them. It was what they did, what they would always do, as brothers. He squeezed Clay’s blanket-covered toes and said firmly, “We’ll never give up on you, kid. Hell, who’s gonna keep an eye on Sonny if I don’t have you?”

Clay smiled and then his eyes fluttered closed.

The safety that came with those words guided his way to sleep far better than any pain medication could.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's a wrap! Your feedback is sincerely appreciated & actually helps to feed my whump muse (Lord knows she needs it for Eleventh Hour.) ;)


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